The Target on Her Back
by WRTRD
Summary: When Castle steps over a line, Beckett lets him know exactly why she was so angry with him for having hidden a lead in her mother's murder case. Set between 5x01, "After the Storm," and 5x02, "Cloudy with a Chance of Murder." Complete.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

Kate Beckett and Rick Castle are still in bed. Still in bed at 10:45 in the morning, and actually still. They've spent a lot of time—an enormous, unheard of, spectacular amount of time—in bed for the last week. More often in his, but today they're in hers. Martha and Alexis are on vacation in Europe and Beckett is on suspension, which leaves her and her partner, her one-hundred-percent-in-every-way partner, free to do whatever they want. "Whatever" has involved a lot of sex, a lot of what Castle insists on calling canoodling, and a lot of talking. The first two whatevers have been perfect; so has the third, most of the time. There have been a couple of little flare-ups, but they've been easily put out with extraordinarily satisfying, invariably imaginative sex.

But this morning is different. Just a minute or two before, he had made coffee and brought it to bed. She had idly wondered what had taken him so long, and why there had been some noise coming from her living room, but had written it off to his insatiable curiosity. Maybe a book had caught his eye, one he had missed on earlier forays, and he wanted to grill her on it. But no. Not that. Not that at all.

"Beckett," he had said, passing her a mug. "We have to talk about something." He had looked serious, uncharacteristically serious, as he had climbed onto his side of the bed and propped himself up against the headboard.

Her antennae had begun quivering. "Of course," she had said.

"The sun's coming in through the shutters in your living room." He had stopped, and briefly closed his eyes. "It made me think."

Uh-oh. Antennae quivering had escalated, but she had tried to sound casual, tried to produce a goofy smile. "Think, Castle? So early in the day?"

He had checked his phone on the nightstand and frowned slightly. "It's getting on for eleven. Not early." He had cleared his throat. "With your shutters backlit like that, I could see the outline of some of your notes on your mother's case. Why don't you take it all down? I know you've looked at it, at least glanced at it, a couple of times in the last few days. I've seen you. Why do you torment yourself? You need to take it down."

She snaps to, and pushes herself up on her elbows. The air has completely changed. "What? Take it down?"

"You weren't going to work on this now, you said. You promised. You know, after Bracken. After you had your 'talk' "—he makes quotation marks in the air with his fingers—"with him last week."

She sits up straight, her spine all but locked in place, and glares at him. "My 'talk'?" She mimics his air quotes. "You mean when I pistol-whipped him?"

"Yeah. That."

"Castle, just because I've put this case on hold doesn't mean I'm putting it away."

"Why not?" Two one-syllable words, shot through with anger. "Why don't you literally put it away? It's not as if you haven't committed everything behind those shutters to memory. You did that ages ago. Let it go. You don't need the constant reminder, Kate."

She's seething now. "The constant _reminder_? I don't need any kind of _reminder_ , Castle. My mother's murder is a part of me. There's not a single detail that I've forgotten, or that I can forget. Not the leads that fizzled out years ago, not the taste of dust in the archives, not the smell of Coonan's blood on my hands or Raglan's on yours. Nothing." She whips her head away. "Nothing."

"Then what's the point?" Castle's jaw is tight as he points to the open door to the living room. "Why does that have to be part of, part of—" He looks almost wild as he sweeps his arm around the bedroom. "Part of all this."

"Jesus, Castle, you're acting as if it's—as if this is decoration. Like it's a poster from a museum."

"Well, isn't that what it is?" he snaps. "Your own little museum?"

The blood vanishes from Beckett's face, leaving her as pale as her mother's ghost. She looks expressionlessly at him, turns to thrust her legs over the side of the bed, and stands up. She's not having this discussion while she's naked; maybe she's not having it at all. Her hands tremble as she grabs a tee shirt and shorts from the chair, and walks out of the room with what dignity she can summon, dressing as she goes. Grateful to find a pair of running shoes by the front door, she scoops them up, along with her keys, and leaves. She races down the hall, pushes open the door to the stairway and holds on to the bannister with one hand as she shoves her feet into the sneakers. The hell with the laces. She'll take care of them when she's out. She has to get out. Out. Anywhere. Out.

When she reaches the street, she turns the corner, ties her shoes and takes off. She doesn't stretch or plot a route or take the measure of her surroundings, all of which are routine for her. She just runs. Runs and runs and runs until pain almost cleaves her. On an oddly desolate stretch of riverfront, she bends over a railing and vomits into the water. And then she drops to her knees on the stained concrete, and sobs. She cries until there is nothing left, especially hope. Hope and trust, two things so long absent from her life that Castle had brought back to her like a gift. And then, just moments ago—or hours, she has lost sense of time—in some perverse, sickening scene, he took them back. No warning. Just tore them away from her. "Your own little museum."

She gets to her feet, with no notion of what to do other than to get rid of the appalling taste in her mouth, the physical one and the metaphorical one. She had told Castle that she could still taste the dust of the archives where the few official bits of her mother's case were stored. This taste is dry and bitter, but worse. It tastes like the end of love. She realizes suddenly that she has no phone and no money. She hasn't the strength, either physical or emotional, to go anywhere, so she waits. When she sees a young woman running towards her, she begins to wave a hand tentatively. The woman slows down, then stops.

"Are you all right? You don't look well. Can I help?"

"Your phone," Beckett says, timidly. "Could I use it for a minute? To call a friend. I'm going to ask her to come get me."

The other woman reaches into her pocket, extracts her phone, and offers it to Beckett.

"Thanks," she says, and punches in a number. The call goes to voice mail. "Lanie, please. Please. Pick up. It's Kate. Please call back. This number. Someone—" she looks a question at the runner.

"Liz. Liz Bennett."

"Liz Bennett lent me her phone. I'm at. I'm. Wait." Beckett looks again at Liz. "Where are we?"

"Near the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Gold Street."

Beckett speaks into the phone again. "I'm near the Brooklyn Navy Yard, on Gold Street. Please can you come get me?" She presses the end call button and returns the phone.

"Are you sure you're all right?" Liz asks uncertainly. "Do you need a doctor?"

Beckett manages a suggestion of a smile. "I just called one." She waits a few beats. "She's a pathologist. Perfect, right? For someone who's as good as dead. Sorry, I'm sorry."

"Um, Kate. Kate, right?"

Beckett nods.

"I'm going to stay here. We'll wait for your friend to call back. If she doesn't do it in the next ten minutes, I'll take you to an urgent care or something, okay? Or home? I could take you home. Do you live near here?"

Beckett looks around. "No. But we're in Brooklyn? I ran to Brooklyn?"

Liz takes Beckett's elbow and points to an empty bench. "Let's sit over here. Did you hit your head?"

"No. No. Not my head. It's—um. No."

The phone rings and Liz answers immediately. "Liz Bennett."

"Ms. Bennett, this is Lanie Parish. Doctor Parish. Excuse me, but did Kate Beckett just use your phone to call me?"

"Yes. I was running by her and she stopped me. Kate. Kate's here. I'll put her on." She holds the phone out to Beckett, who takes it shakily.

"Lanie?"

"Kate, what the hell? What happened? Castle called me. He's frantic. Are you hurt?"

"Not really."

"I don't even want to know what that means. I'm on my way. Stay there, please. Let me talk to Liz, okay?"

"Okay." She starts to hand over the phone, but pulls it sharply back. "Lanie? Castle called you? Don't let him come. Just you. You come. Promise me. Just you."

"I promise. Now please, let me talk to Liz."

This time Beckett completes the handover. "Hello?"

"Liz, thank you very much for your help. Can you tell me exactly how to find you?"

"We're near a coffee shop on the corner of Gold and Marshall. We can wait for you there."

"Good, fine. I'll be there in ten minutes, fifteen, tops. And can you tell me, just yes or no, if Kate is physically all right?"

Liz shifts uneasily. "Uh."

"Okay, can she stand on her own?"

"Yes."

"Is she bleeding?"

"No."

"Can she walk? Will she be able to walk to the coffee shop with you?"

"Yes."

"Okay, thank you. And listen, Liz? You're fine with her, all right? Kate's a detective. A homicide detective. NYPD."

Liz can't help but gawp. "Seriously?"

"Yes. I'm getting in my car right now. Thank you."

"Okay. No problem." Liz pockets her phone, and turns to the wraith she can hardly believe is a cop. "Kate? Your friend Lanie is going to meet us at a coffee shop just a few minutes from here, all right?"

Beckett looks ruefully at her. "All right. Thank you. But really, you should go. I'm fine, really. I so appreciate your help but I'll be fine there on my own. I've already taken too much of you. Of your time. You were on a run. Me, too."

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

Castle is in his basement office at The Old Haunt, a half-full bottle of Scotch on his desk, a half-empty glass next to it. When Kate ran out—and he knew that she'd run full tilt the minute she hit the street—he was as angry as he'd ever been. Even more than last month, when she was maniacally pitting herself against Maddox. He had gone to her apartment and pleaded with her to back off, but wouldn't. She had said it was her life, and he had told her, "You can throw it away if you want, but I'm not gonna stick around and watch you." And then he had walked out her door, sure that he would never see her again.

A day and a half later, she had walked through his, looked up at him through wet lashes that he still feels on his cheek, and said, "I just want you."

That was a week ago. Impossible, that it's just a week. The greatest week of his life. So what the hell happened? If all she wants is him, what the hell happened? He has spent most of the five hours and thirty-seven minutes since she left him wearing a groove in a cranial nerve as he has gone over and over and over this morning's conversation, from the time he made the coffee. It was that goddamn board. He had seen her glance at it when she had sworn, sworn, that she had put Johanna Beckett's case on the shelf. She has a deal with Bracken. She's safe. So why is she doing this?

In the space of a week, they'd become closer than he had ever dreamed. But there were a couple of times when he caught her looking at the shuttered display of her mother's case. Kate was there, but not there. She wasn't his. She wasn't anyone's. She just disappeared into the ether, someplace that he couldn't reach, and she wasn't even aware that he was trying. Last night was the third time. It was just a moment, but an unsettling one. He had poured her some wine, and held the glass out to her. She hadn't seen it, couldn't see it. When he finally got her attention, she smiled and took the wine and said thank you. That was it. As if nothing had happened. And then he needled her about something and she snapped back and they had an argument about nothing and then phenomenal slightly-angry sex followed by even better make-up sex.

It had begun to rankle. And when he'd seen the sun silhouetting parts of her murder board this morning, he'd known that he had to say something. Get it over with. But it had been a disaster. Her reaction had been incomprehensible to him. Extreme and incomprehensible. And then, after two hours, seven minutes and counting, the penny dropped. A penny dropped. It was "personal museum." That's what had driven her off. Okay, he shouldn't have said it, really shouldn't have said it, but goddammit. Goddammit.

He had still been at her place then, and had decided to tidy it up. She was going to come back and they would clear the air with a long conversation in this clean, well-lighted place. Figure out what's going on and fix things. His anger had dissipated a little.

It was when he stripped the bed that his emotional state began to change. He was peeling the fitted sheet off one corner of the mattress when he noticed that her phone was still on the nightstand, and he froze. She had been gone for almost two and a half hours, with no phone. He dropped the sheet and ran to the door to check the brass bowl where she kept her keys. They were still there. When he turned to the chair where she always dropped her bag and saw that it was there, too, that her wallet was there, his heart rate spiked. The things that she always took with her were there, in her place. She never, ever left those behind. Panic began to overwhelm anger. Oh, God, her gun. What about her gun? He knew the combination to the safe, but his fingers weren't working. On the third try, he got it open. Her gun was there. Her badge and her regulation gun were with Gates, or whoever holds on to those things for a detective on suspension, but her back-up gun was there.

At that instant, frantic rushed in to join panic. Where was Beckett? Was she hurt? She couldn't go to the precinct, she wouldn't go to her father's. Lanie. Maybe Lanie. He had sat down, hard, on the sofa. No one knew they were together, if they even were together after this, but Lanie was the only possibility. He had been sure of it. If Kate were to run to someone, it would be Lanie. And if he were to break a trust by telling her about them, so what? His hands had been so sweaty and so unsteady that he had dropped the phone. When he had tried again, she had answered on the fifth ring.

"Hey, Castle, what's up?"

"Kate. It's Kate. Um, Beckett."

"Yeah? What about her?"

"Is she with you?"

"Really? I'm in the morgue, Castle, about to cut open a 350-pound, 42-year-old man who may or may not have died naturally while eating half a gallon of mint chocolate chip ice cream, and Kate's on suspension. Why would she be here?"

"Sorry." He had been using all his self-control not to shout or to break down. "Sorry, Lanie. Listen, I don't know where she is."

"And it's imperative that you find her this instant, at two o'clock on a Tuesday afternoon?"

"Uh. Just a sec." Breathe, he had told himself. Breathe. "Yes. Listen, Lanie. Beckett, Kate. We're together. Have been for a week. But we—"

"Whoa! Richard Castle, you're telling me that you and Kate are finally doing the horizontal tango and I'm only hearing this now, a week into your _romance_?"

"Well, yes, but—"

"Don't 'well, yes, but' me, mister. And why are you the one who's letting me in on your little secret, not Kate?"

"Because she's gone, Lanie." So much for not shouting.

"Gone?"

"We had a terrible fight this morning and she took off. She's been gone for three hours, Lanie. Three. She left her phone and her wallet. And everything. Everthing. No jacket. Nothing but running shoes, shorts and a tee shirt. Not even, uh, not even underwear."

"Slow down, Castle. You've seen her do this before, right? She'll come back. She just needs to clear her head. Why don't you—"

He had interrupted her. "No. No, whatever you're going to suggest. She was wild. I've never seen her so upset. Angry." Breathe. Breathe. "Hurt."

"Hurt? How, hurt?"

"I said something pretty awful. So did she. Look. I'm really worried here, Lanie. If—just. If she calls you, will you let me know? I know she's your best friend, but please. I have to know if she's all right. Have to. Just."

"Castle? Are you okay?"

"No."

"This is serious, then. I won't ask what happened, but where are you now?"

"At Kate's."

"It sounds like you should go. Go wait at your place, not hers. She might need to lick her wounds at home, you know."

"Yeah. But I don't want to go home. It's too, I don't know. I can't be there."

"Here's what I think you should do, then. Go the Old Haunt. Stay in your office there."

"Okay."

"And Castle?"

"What?"

"For God's sake, don't drink yourself into a stupor. Promise me. That would be a terrible idea, especially for Kate to see you that way."

"Yeah. Okay. Okay. I'll go. And you'll call me if Kate does. Or turns up, right? When she turns up."

"I promise. Get going, Castle. It's time."

"Yeah. Bye." It was only after he had shut the door and was on his way out of the building that he had realized that he hadn't said thank you.

That was more than two hours ago, and he's been in the bar, downstairs, ever since. Despite Lanie's caution to him, he opened a bottle of Glenlivet Archive 21-year-old Scotch and poured himself a drink. Two sips later, he poured the rest down the drain. He's done this two more times, tossing out the single malt rather than tossing it back. He's on his fourth glass now, but he's had no more than a couple of tablespoons, total, since cracking the seal. He feels too sick to drink, but too terrified not to try. Liquid courage, what a joke. He's staring into the glass when his cell phone rings, and he sees Lanie's name. He grabs the phone.

"Is she there? Do you have her?"

"Castle. I'm in the car, about to cross the Brooklyn Bridge."

"Brooklyn? Beckett's in Brooklyn? Why? Is she all right? Have you spoken with her?"

"Apparently she had been running and was somewhat disoriented. Another runner stopped to help her and lend her her phone. I've talked to both of them. I'm on my way to get her."

"What's the address?"

"No."

"What? You have to tell me where she is."

"I can't, Castle." Lanie is firm, but her voice is kind. "She was adamant that I come alone, and I have to honor that."

"What did she say about me? Are you sure she's not hurt? What about her being, you know, disoriented? I don't think she's eaten since yesterday."

"I don't know, Castle. She's well enough to walk a couple of blocks to a coffee shop where I'm meeting them."

"Them? Who them?"

"Kate and the runner who stopped to help her. Liz, the runner, texted me that Kate said she was fine, told her to leave, but Liz wouldn't do it, bless her heart. Said she'd stay 'til I get there."

"Okay, okay. Can you—"

"I gotta go, Castle."

"Call me, call me. After. Call me."

But she isn't there. She has already hung up.

Castle puts his forehead on his desk. He can't think. And suddenly a song from the musical _Company_ , which his mother had appeared in in summer stock when he was thirteen, takes up residence in his brain. The same two lines, again and again. "You're sorry-grateful/Regretful-happy."

While Castle is consumed with sorrow and gratitude, Lanie pulls to the curb near the coffee shop, parks in an illegal spot, and puts her ME sign on the visor to prevent the car from being towed. She's heading to the door when she sees Kate and, presumably, Liz, huddled next to it.

"Lanie? Doctor Parish?" Liz asks as the medical examiner approaches.

"Lanie. It's Lanie."

Liz looks as scared as she had sounded on the phone a few minutes ago. "She didn't want to go in," she says miserably, nodding towards Kate.

"That's all right. I'll take it from here. Liz? I can't thank you enough. Neither can Kate. I have your number and I'll be in touch." Lanie reaches out and takes Kate's hand, while still looking at the good samaritan. "Can I drop you anywhere?"

"No. No, thanks. I live right in the neighborhood and I should be going. I hope everything turns out all right. I'm really sorry. About Kate. Your friend."

"We'll be fine," Lanie says reassuringly. "You go. Thanks again." She pulls Liz towards her in a clumsy, one-arm hug, still holding onto Kate with her other hand.

"Bye, Lanie." Liz says, looking relieved and shy. "Bye, Kate."

Kate raises her head. "Thank you, Liz. For, um, saving me." She squeezes Lanie's hand and finally looks her in the eye. "Can you drive me home, please? I need to be home."

 **A/N** For those who are anxious or pissed off: the couple in conflict will have their much-needed conversation in the next chapter.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

Saying only that she had to deal with an emergency, Lanie had found someone to cover for her at the morgue. She had gotten very little from Kate outside the Brooklyn coffee shop, and understood that she should leave her alone during the drive back over the bridge to Manhattan. When they're a few blocks from Kate's apartment she says, "I'm going to stop at the deli and get a few things for you, okay?"

"Thanks, but you don't have to."

"You should get something in your stomach, Kate, and I know the state of your refrigerator."

Kate squirms a little in her seat. "I have stuff," she mumbles.

"Yeah and I'm betting that all of that stuff is ten years past its sell-by date."

"No, it's not."

Lanie is trying to keep things as light as she can for the moment. "You mean like mustard, maybe? Or a jar of honey in the cabinet?"

Silence stretches out through two traffic lights, until Kate says, leaving no space between her words, "There's eggs and bacon and strawberries and cantaloupe and juice and cream and roast beef and three kinds of cheese and yogurt and bread and butter and mayonnaise. And a chicken." And she closes her eyes and rests her cheek, which finally has some color, against the car window.

The recitation stuns Lanie. Castle had said they were together, but this is _together_. He had set up house at her house. Kate had never allowed anyone to do that. "So, you're good then," Lanie says, hoping that it sounds casual.

"Yeah."

They're in front of Kate's building now, with the almost unprecedented good luck of a parking space just two car lengths away. "Okay, we're home. You're home. I'm coming up with you and you can tell me what happened."

Kate nods, opens the car door and stops. "Shit. Shit. My keys. I left them behind. We can't get in."

"Sure we can," Lanie says, joining her friend on the sidewalk and passing her a jangling key ring. "I have a set, remember? For emergencies? And I keep them with mine, so here."

Kate lets them into the lobby and then, a minute later, into her own apartment. She inhales sharply. Everything is immaculate. Sparkling. Perfect. "Castle," she whispers.

"I can hear you, you know," says Lanie, who is standing directly behind her.

"Oh." Barely above a whisper.

"Kate, why don't you sit down?" Lanie says, squeezing her arm. "I'm putting the kettle on and making you some toast. I'm sure Castle bought bread made from harvested-by-hand rye or unborn wheat or something."

"Yeah," Kate says, offering up a slightly watery smile. "He did."

Lanie slips some bread into the toaster and then offers a level glance in return. "You gonna tell me about it, sweetie?"

"Sounds like you already figured it out," Kate says, looking down at her lap.

"That's not what I meant, Kate."

"I know."

"Do you?"

"I guess."

"We're going to talk about this, a lot, but that's for later. Right now I want to deal with the right now. He called me, Kate. Castle called me a couple of hours ago. He is really, really worried about you. And from where I'm sitting, I can understand why."

"I'm—"

Lanie puts her hand up like a traffic cop. "Don't even say it. Don't tell me you're fine. And just hold on a sec while I put something on your toast." She opens the fridge, takes out a dish, makes an unintelligible noise, and slathers the toast. "French butter. Of course. Now eat this, please." She slides the plate across the counter.

"I don't know where to start, Lanie."

"Then I'll start for you. You and Castle are together—and no, he didn't give me any details, just said that it's been a week. You had a terrible fight this morning; he said something he regrets—no, I don't know what he said—and you said something back, I'm guessing. And then you ran out leaving everything behind, even your phone, not to mention your undies, and you didn't come back. You'd already been gone for three hours when he finally called me, Kate. He was beside himself. Still is."

"Lanie, I—"

"No, I have to finish this part, and then you can talk." She pulls up a stool and sits next to Kate. "You're my best friend. I've got your back. I'll always have your back. I don't know what happened this morning, or what it came from, but I'm pretty sure that it wasn't out of the blue. And what I do know is that Castle has your back, too. He loves you, Kate. Loves you. When he called me he made me promise to let him know if I heard from you."

"Did you? Does he know I was, you know." She trails off.

"I called him when I was on the way to Brooklyn. He wanted to come, but I said no, that you didn't want that."

"Oh. Okay."

"Not okay. When he called me, he was at your place, waiting for you to come home. I told him that I thought he should go, but he said he couldn't bear to be at his loft. So I suggested that he go to the Old Haunt, to his office, and that's where he is. Has been, for hours."

Kate waits a long time before she speaks. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do."

Lanie reaches out for Kate's hand and takes it. "Yes, you do. You have to talk to him. I'm not getting in the middle of this, because believe it or not, I know that I shouldn't. But I will do this. I will stay here with you, if that's what you want, until he comes over here so you two can talk. Or I'll take you to the Old Haunt, if that's what you want. Or to his place. Your choice, so long as you have a conversation. You owe yourself that. And, again, even though I don't know what you said to each other, you owe him that, too."

When Kate begins to cry, it's nothing like the convulsive, all-encompassing sobs that left her spent on the Brooklyn riverfront. This is quiet, and steady. She doesn't want the Kleenex that Lanie gets from her purse and puts in front of her. She wants the tears to run down her neck and onto her grubby tee shirt, and soak her. Finally she rubs the heels of her hands over her eyes, and slides off the kitchen stool. "Let's go," she says.

Her friend sizes her up quickly. "Do you want to change?"

"Nope. Just want to go."

"Okay, then. Where to?"

"The Old Haunt."

"You want to call him and tell him you're coming?"

"No. I just want to go."

"Good as there, sweetie."

Ten minutes later, they are. Kate reaches across to hug her friend before she gets out. "Thank you, Lanie. I'm going in the back way, down the stairs. I'll call you."

"You'd better."

"I will. It just might not be tonight."

"I hope not." She puts the car in gear and drives away.

Kate finds her way down the dimly-lit stairs to the office and knocks, so unsure of herself that she has to lean on the jamb. When Castle yanks the door open, he's dumbstruck. They can't take their eyes off each other, and each is painfully recalling a similar moment at his loft door, seven days ago. There are so many conflicting, highly-charged emotions in the space between them that neither says a word. It's Castle who breaks first. "Kate. Oh, thank God. Kate. Kate." He wraps his arms around her, lifts her up, and carries her inside, his face buried in her hair. She's clinging to him with a force she wouldn't have thought possible, had she thought of it at all. But all she is aware of as he walks them across the room is how he smells and how he feels, the play of his muscles at every point of contact with her body.

He is as lost in her as she is in him. He wants to rediscover every inch of her, as if every inch weren't already burned into all his senses. "Sofa," he says against her ear.

"Yes," she says. "Yes."

As soon as she sits down, she pulls him on top of her. It should be awkward, physically and emotionally, but it's not. They're already so in synch, so desperate to be together despite the weight of the entire horrendous day, that everything is fluid. She's longing to taste him, to find no bitterness on his tongue as she covers his mouth with hers. They revel in a series of slow, deep kisses—slow because things had fallen apart so quickly this morning—everything given and everything received. When he moves to run his tongue along the curve of her ear, one of the most sensitive spots on her finely-tuned body, she moans. Her running shorts are hiked up, leaving her thighs completely exposed, and as he presses his knee against hers to spread her wide, she bends one leg and digs a foot into the small of his back, drawing him even closer. But when he grips the hem of her tee shirt and tries to raise it over her head, she puts her hand over his and tugs the jersey back down. She's stretched out beneath him, knows that he is as aroused as she, and can barely catch her breath. "We have to stop, Castle."

He turns his hand over so that his palm is flat against hers. "I want you, Kate."

"And I want you, but we have to stop this."

He startles, hurt and doubt coming into his eyes. "Why? If you want me."

"It's _because_ I want you, Castle. We have to make this right, and sex won't do it. Not this time. Not until we talk. You're still angry at me, aren't you? Really angry."

He doesn't say anything.

"Please. You are, just say it." She moves from under him to sit up, and pushes her hands through her messy hair. "If ever there were a time to be completely honest, this is it. I know you're still mad, and I'm still really mad at you. I don't understand this morning, what you said, and I need to. And I need you to—. I need you to understand more. Oh, God." She puts her hand on his cheek, and holds it there for a moment. "There's so much at stake now, Castle. We're at stake. The two of us. I don't think I can stand it if we fuck this up. We have to get this out."

He moves away from her, just slightly, as he sits up, too. A muscle twitches at the hinge of his jaw. "Okay. You're right. I'm mad."

She closes the distance so that they are only an inch apart. She needs the physical closeness if she's going to get through this, and she thinks he does, too. Hopes that he does. "You go first, then. You know my mother's case almost as well as I do. Why suddenly did you want me to get rid of my board?"

"I didn't say get rid of it, Beckett, I said take it down."

She tries not to bristle at his quibbling, tries to ignore his switch from Kate to Beckett. "Take it down, then. All of a sudden, I should take it down?"

"Because I've watched you drown yourself in it. Three times this week, Kate. Three times." He stops, bows his head, then lifts it up again, but he's looking across the room, not at her. "Three times you didn't even realize that I was there when you were standing in front of those shutters. So I have to wonder, is the physical manifestation of that case—your notes on the case—more important than we are? Than what I thought we have?"

She's almost as ashen as she had been when she had run out of her apartment. "That's what you thought? That I was drowning in it? I wasn't drowning, Castle. Just the opposite."

His voice has an edge. "What's that mean?"

"I'm trying to explain. Please don't be, don't be confrontational. I'm trying to tell you."

"All right."

"I was reflecting. Buoyed up by it. I don't know quite what to call it, but reflecting is the closest. I'm not working the case, I promise. Look at the last week, Castle, what's happened in the last week. We're us. There's an us now, after everything." She senses that he's about to say something, and puts her hand on his knee and squeezes it. "Don't say there's no us. Please don't say that."

When he's silent, she picks up the thread again. "In the last week, we became us. But I also nearly died and I also got the upper hand with Bracken, after thirteen and a half years. That's a hell of a week." She shakes her head as if she needs to convince herself of it. "This isn't the end of my mother's case, but I know who killed her and why, and I will get that bastard someday. We will get that bastard, together, when it's the right time. And you're staying in my apartment, Castle. No one has ever done that, but somehow it feels like the most natural thing in the world and it makes me so happy."

She stops to tell herself to keep going, to lay everything out so he will understand. "I could never have gotten Bracken without you. Never. But I made that board when I was at one of my lowest points ever, you know? When you were in the Hamptons over the summer with Gina. It kept me focussed, kept me from beating myself up over your being with her, maybe not coming back. And then, um, then, you saw it that day. Remember? You said you forgot that I have to live with that every day? Do you remember that?"

"Of course I do, Kate."

Oh, he said Kate, she thinks. That has to be a good thing, an encouraging thing. "And we made all that progress together. That board isn't a sad thing for me any more. I mean, it is because it's a chronicle of my mother's murder, but it's also the physical reminder of what you and I did together. It's a record of a kind of triumph, of justice. So I'll never get rid of it. At some point I'll put it away, in a box, but I'm not ready to do that yet, all right? And if I didn't notice that you were standing near me when I was going over all this, it wasn't that I was unaware of you or engulfed by the case. You were in my mind the entire time I was standing there, do you see?" She presses her fingers to her forehead. "You were in here, the whole time."

She coughs, and swallows hard. "I'm so sorry that you thought I was burying myself in the case again, Castle. I didn't realize that. I wish you had said something. Why didn't you? Why can't we ask ourselves these things now? I don't want to be in a sea of misunderstanding all the time."

He looks serious, but at least he looks straight at her. "You're right. We aren't good at it. I wish that I'd asked you. And for the record, I'm really sorry for what I said, about your personal museum. I was hurt and I was pissed off and that's what came out. But you were off-the-charts mad, you know?" He waits to see if she acknowledges it, and when she nods her head, he goes on. "The minute I mentioned it, and that's something I still don't get. I've never seen you like that. We were in bed, together, and then you were gone. Major-league gone. You took off as if I had just committed the worst crime possible, and I didn't know why. Don't know. Because I don't think it's that I called your board your personal museum. Is it? That's not it, is it?"

Kate shakes her head. No.

"Then what is is, Kate? Can I fix it? Can we fix it? Will you help me fix it? Because I love you."

She looks at him with a mixture of sorrow and hope. "I want to fix it. Because I love you. But I have to get rid of being mad at you. I thought I had, until this morning."

"But you hadn't?" he asks quietly.

"I hadn't. Your being furious about the board this morning sent me right back. It's something that I never talked to you about, and I want to now. I love you. I love us. I want an us. It was because of the last year, Castle, this whole last year until two weeks ago, until the deal with Bracken. From the morning after I was shot, I thought I had a target on my back. I lived with that terror every second, awake and asleep, and I wasn't sleeping much. That's an absolutely debilitating terror. You knew the target wasn't there, but you didn't tell me. And I have to explain to you what that did to me."

TBC

 **A/N** One chapter to go. All will be well.


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

"I'm going to make some coffee," Castle says, getting to his feet. "Would you like some?" He has a hint of a smile as he asks.

She smiles back. "Your coffee? Yes, please. I didn't get to drink the mug you made this morning."

He does a double take. "Good. I'll be right back."

While he revs up his Ferrari-like office coffeemaker, she braces herself for the conversational road ahead. The worst part, she thinks, is behind them, because they've survived her outlining for him why she was so upset. Still, she's trembling a little at what's coming, the details, and wishes that she could sit on her hands to stop them shaking. When Castle returns with two mugs, she takes one and pats the cushion next to her. She doesn't want him at the other end of sofa, at the figurative other end of the world.

"You think it's weird to be steadying our nerves with this?" Kate asks after he sits down, looking at him over the top of her coffee.

"Not when you consider what usually gets drunk in here," he says.

Just as the words leave his mouth she notices the bottle of Scotch and the glass on his desk, and cocks her head in that direction. "Like that, Castle?" There's no judgment in her voice, just an underlay of concern.

He follows her gaze. "Exactly like that. But Kate? I threw almost all of it away. I haven't had more than a couple of ounces in three hours."

"Oh, God, I'm sorry." She stops talking again, for a moment. "I'm sorry that you've been here so long, waiting." She puts her mug down on the end table, laces her fingers together and looks steadily at him. "Do you remember what I said last week when you came to my place and told me that I had to stop investigating? When I ripped into you because you had sat on a lead in my mother's case for a year?"

"The only way I could forget that, Kate, forget anything you said then, is if I were brain dead."

"I know. It's, well. It's—. That's what made me so angry at first, but later, after you'd walked out, what crushed me was that you had known that I was safe and I hadn't. All I could think about was the paralyzing fear I'd been living with, you know?" She's unaware that she's pressing her hand between her breasts, at the spot where the sniper's bullet entered her chest. Castle, on the other hand, is very aware of the movement, and he winces.

"All that summer at my father's cabin, last year, after I got out of the hospital, that woodsy paradise was hell. When I came back to work I told the boys that I left because the chirping crickets were driving me nuts."

"I'm guessing that wasn't it?"

"Right, it wasn't. It was every snap of a twig, every rustle of a leaf, everything. I thought that every noise I heard was made by the man who was gunning for me, Castle. He was right outside, somewhere behind the trees, in the trees, waiting to take his shot. I could barely walk when I first got there. Even when I was a lot better, I still couldn't run. How in hell was I going to be able to escape from him? I came back to the city way earlier than anyone knew, eighteen days before I showed up at the precinct. Just locked myself in my apartment. The physical therapist came there. I called out for food. Took a car service to the shrink so I didn't have to stand in the street to hail a cab."

Castle looks stricken. "Why the hell didn't you call, Kate? Call someone, even if it couldn't be me."

"It's what I said, Castle. Crippling fear. The other things you know, from what we've talked about since then. But the fear. When I was going after Maddox last week, and you were off the team? In my mind I kept going over the cases that were the worst for me, the ones I could have coped with better if I'd known about the deal to keep me safe. At least, not been in a cold sweat or puking my guts out."

"But I told you right at the beginning, a couple of days after you came back, that you were in a free fall. I tried to stop you then, right then. Right after I spoke to Smith. I tried so hard to stop you. I told you we could work on your mother's case later, said we would do it together, but that it wasn't worth your life."

Her eyes blaze. "That's just it, Castle. That was the time you could have told me about Smith."

His eyes do the same. "And you would have gone right after—"

"No, please. We can't start screaming at each other. I want to just get this out and put it behind us. Forever. I don't want to shove it in a box and pry the lid off again later. So, let's just say maybe you're right, that right then I would have gone after them. Maybe I wouldn't have listened to you, or maybe I would have. I say I wouldn't have. But you had just found out about the deal for keeping me safe, so at least you wouldn't have been keeping it from me for months."

She stops. They're both waiting something out, and she suddenly turns and puts her arms around him. "This is so damn hard, Castle," she whispers. "I hate this. But I have to keep going, okay?"

It feels like forever, but he says, "Okay."

Kates let him go, reaches for her coffee and holds it against her chest. "What about another time? You could have sat with me another time and laid it out. You remember the Lee Travis case? You know, the sniper? That was one of the worst for me."

"Yeah, I know. You were a wreck."

"Damn right I was a wreck, Castle. Worse than a wreck. The night we were in that apartment? The one where he was when he shot Sarah Vasquez? The next day I had a huge bandage on my arm. You must have noticed; you notice everything. It was right before Thanksgiving, exactly six months since my shooting."

"Yeah, the bandage. The one you kept trying to hide with your sleeve."

"You never asked me about it, never said a word."

"You were so closed off, Kate, and so anxious. I was afraid that you'd throw me out."

"You'd said you loved me. Before. In the cemetery. But you didn't love me enough to try to do something for me on that case?"

"I did try something. I did. I was so worried about you. I talked to Esposito about what helped him when he came back from the war and then he talked with you."

She covers his hand with hers, pushes his fingers apart with her own. "I know. I found out later that you had, and I'm grateful to both of you. I really am. But how much I could have used you, Castle, _you_. You saw my meltdown when I interviewed Ford, the guy from the shooting range. You knew I was falling apart." She pulls her hand away and touches her fingers to the inside of her forearm. "Do you know why I was wearing that bandage? I went home from the apartment where Travis shot Sarah and drank so much I don't know how I lived through it. I dropped a glass and it shattered in a million pieces. I kept hearing sirens and guns in my head, so I crawled over the floor to get my own gun and sliced up my arm on the glass that was all over the floor." She pauses again, stares at the bottle of Scotch across the room, and shakes her head. "I had just enough working brain cells to wrap it up in a towel to stop the bleeding. As soon as it got light out I went to the ER and had some stitches. Gave them a fake ID. Didn't want it on the record."

He recoils. "You did that?"

"Yes, I did."

He circles her wrist with his hand, and draws it up. "When I asked you about that scar the other night in bed, you told me it was where you'd accidentally cut yourself on a broken glass."

"And that's the truth."

"You could have told me the whole story."

"And what would you have said, Castle?"

He doesn't answer.

"When you saw me fall on the sidewalk during that case, you knew, you had to know, that I was about a millimeter away from completely losing it. You knew I was fearful of a sniper, but you still kept it from me."

Castle clears his throat. "I remember that. But you know what else I remember? It was when the case was over, after Espo took out the sniper who was about to kill you—about to kill you, shoot you at point-blank range, Kate. You thanked me. You thanked me for giving you space and not pushing you."

"I did. But I didn't know then what I do now, and that's the difference. Castle, do you understand what I'm saying, what I'm trying to say? I was terrified. I was hunted and haunted and terrified. I'm not afraid now. It's over. Not really, but I'll get there. But—but if you can put yourself in my shoes. Do you see?"

"Yeah, I do. I think I do."

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"If we could go back to last September, to right after you talked to Smith. If we went back but you knew everything I've said here, what would you do? Would you tell me?"

She feels as if everything is in the balance. Everything is teetering. If he says no, what would she do? Get up and walk out, throw away the best thing that has ever happened to her, just as it's beginning? What if he says he doesn't know? Can't decide? That's no better. Not really. She feels as if she's suffocating, but she's cold. She feels as cold as she had when they were in that freezer, and she almost told him that she loved him. Should have told him. Would have if she hadn't passed out in the middle of it, as if it were a dying declaration. Which is what she thought, that they were dying.

He's still quiet when she suddenly sags against him, and rolls her head against his chest. "I love you," she mumbles, her mouth pressed to the placket of his shirt.

"Yes," he says.

She pulls back and looks up at him in confusion. "What?"

"Yes. Yes I would tell you."

She moves into his lap and hangs on to him as if she were drowning, except that she suddenly feels light. She doesn't say anything for a long time, and neither does he. "Castle?" she asks, against his collarbone.

"Mmmm."

"Are you still mad? At me?"

"No." He looks down at her and pushes her hair back from her forehead. "Are you still mad at me?"

"No. It's all out. It's gone. But I'm so tired."

"How about we go home?"

"To your place?"

"Sure."

"Would you mind if we went to mine?"

"Of course not. You must need to be at home after all this. This, uh, day."

She's picking at the third button on his shirt. "That's not why."

It's his turn to be confused. "It's not?"

"No. I want to go to my place because that's where everything went to pieces this morning and I want us to go back and know that we're mended. So it's a good place to be, not a bad one."

"Sounds good to me. You ready to go?"

"Yes. Very ready."

And they leave his office, lock the door behind them, and go up the stairs to the street. He had called for a car, and it's there at the curb. Because it's late, and traffic on a weeknight is light, they get to her building quickly. As soon as they're inside her apartment, she goes to the refrigerator and takes out a bowl of strawberries.

"Open wide," she says, holding a small, perfect berry just an inch from his mouth.

He does as he's told, chews and swallows. She leans forward and licks a drop of juice from his chin. "You know what?" she says into his lips.

"What?"

"Turns out I'm not completely tired, after all."

 **A/N** Many, many thanks to everyone who took the time to read this, especially those who also took the time to review, by screen name or anonymously. Except, that is, for one or two anonymous trolls. I let your comments appear because I don't approve of censorship except in the extreme, but also so that other readers can see the bile you spew. You trolls are rampaging through the Castle fanfic at the moment, bashing writers whose take on the show isn't identical to yours, and being contemptuous of and/or hostile to other reviewers. Virtually all of you are anonymous. The perverse twist is that when you comment anonymously, you're "Guests," when in fact you're cowards. Too bad "Coward" isn't a category. We're sick of you. You've driven away a couple of writers, but no more. From now on, I'm not giving you nameless trolls any airtime. I'll simply delete your so-called reviews and no one will be able to read them. I'm happy to publish any anonymous review that isn't venom, but not yours.


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